1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of automated projection systems for displaying movie film. In particular the invention provides film having images printed side by side to allow presentation of one set of images in a forward direction and the adjacent images in a rearward direction by moving the projection head and associated aperture plate and film guide laterally with respect to the lens and lamp-house for display of the film images.
2. Prior Art
Movie film projection equipment requires complex mechanical systems to drive the film through the projector to provide smooth image projection. Years of effort have resulted in highly sophisticated mechanical systems to achieve this end.
Even for short subjects, cartoons, or other short films the length of film becomes very long. Typical feature length films require extremely large film reels and may employ multiple film reels projected sequentially on different projectors to provide a full length motion picture film. At the conclusion of such a film presentation the film must be rewound to be available for the next presentation. The requirement for rewinding limits the ability to automate film projection systems. Even if the film is rewound with the film remaining in the projector gate to allow automation by merely reversing the film for rewind, a significant time period is required for rewinding the film to its start point.
In the alternative, for certain applications, highly sophisticated and mechanically complex continuous loop systems have been developed to allow immediate replay of a film. The cost and complexity of these systems however preclude large scale distribution at reasonable cost.
The concept of printing multiple images side by side on a single film to allow presentation of one image in a forward direction and presentation of the second image in a reverse direction has been known. Exemplary of this prior art is European Patent Publication 0191559 by inventor John Mosely. Early reversing projector systems provided the basic approach for allowing a single projector to continuously display a film without film rewinding while eliminating the complexity of the endless loop systems.
The present invention provides refinement of the reversing projector concept to simplify the mechanical arrangement of the projector thereby reducing cost and providing high quality image projection.